
          Pray write Darlington, if you still have a 
 letter of his unanswered. The poor man has lately
 lost his wife, after an union of 39 years.
 He is greatly saddened. 


 Agassiz is sick, confined strictly to his 
 bed for 10 days past, is now convalescent. 


 Sprague has not your herb. [herbarium] specimens of
 Selenia, and I have looked everywhere they
 should be. Perhaps they have got misplaced in
 some of the portfolios of yours I have. If so they 
 must turn up. For the figure we shall 
 do well with the plant you sent: but it was 
 all the [var?] with no septum. I want to see this 
 last for the tissue, areoleae. But you will 
 be surprised at one result which your specimens 
 yielded to Spragues quick, and always accurate
 eye, and which turns the tables upon us. 
 Selenia belongs directly to [Alyssarieae?]: the radicle
 is ascending on the side remote from the septum!
 A curious prolongation of the cavity of the seed on 
 the [crossed out: side] cotyledonar side deceived you, but 
 the radicle is not there, but on the other side, 
 as ordinary. I was very sorry not to see 
 Mrs. Torrey, but the stress of work on my hands 


 [in margin, vertically]
 I know not where the fig. [figure] of Selenia was published. 
 The specimens of Asclepiad, left with DeCaisne were lost, with some memoirs. 
        